“And then!” repeated the giant, grinning. “Then we’ll have a fair shake with him!”
Quickly the three threw themselves down in attitudes of unconsciousness. Neil flung himself on the sill of the port nearest the Martian, in such a position that he could keep a cautious lookout.
Closer and closer came the enemy. Slowing down, he almost scraped against their side. Peeping out, Neil could see a port directly opposite. A Martian face, swarthy and skeleton-lean, was looking into the interior.
What the fellow discovered evidently reassured him. He could be seen pulling on a heavy spacesuit over his scrawny limbs and clasping a helmet into place. Then a long jointed arm of metal extended from his ship to grapple and hold the supposedly disabled Terrestrial. A moment later a lock-panel opened and the Martian emerged to jump lightly across the few feet of intervening space.
They heard him working at their own entrance panel, evidently with some sort of ray apparatus. Soon he had negotiated the lock and entered. Fastening the panel behind him, he stepped over to where Bull Mike lay. He did not even trouble to draw his automatic pistol from its holster as he bent down to examine the silent form.
Easily, effortlessly, Bull Mike shot out his big hand and yanked the Martian’s feet out from under him.
Down crashed the Martian. His gloved hand fumbled with the butt of his pistol, but Sukune was there first and snatched the weapon away. Bull Mike sat up quickly, cradling the struggling enemy in his arms as though he were a baby.
“Got him!” snorted the big fellow. “Let’s appoint me as a committee of one to break him in two across my knee.”
“Wait a minute,” said Sukune, flinging out a restraining hand. “I want to question him first.”
“What about?” asked Bull Mike.
“Lots of things. About where he came from, for instance.”
“That’s an easy one. He came from Mars,” said Bull Mike. “Hi, you, lie still or I’ll do your legs in a braid!” This last to the prisoner.
“Not directly, he didn’t come from Mars,” said Neil. “He couldn’t travel that far. He must have a base somewhere near. Perhaps he’s a survivor from that bunch that was rubbed out on the Moon after they landed their big spaceship there last spring.”
“Thunder, that’s so,” admitted Bull Mike, as with no gentle hand he unfastened and plucked away the space helmet. The prisoner grimaced in impotent rage.
“You’re a heroic customer, attacking a defenseless ship!” scolded Bull Mike in very bad Martian. “What brought you here? Where’s your headquarters?”
They rose to their feet and allowed the prisoner to do likewise. He looked at each in turn, undaunted by the reversal of fortunes.
“I’ll tell you nothing,” he said shortly in their own language. “Kill me if you want to.”
II
An Incredible Story
Bull Mike’s open hand drove at him, its hard heel striking his chin. With a gasp the Martian collapsed and would have fallen had not Neil caught and supported him.
“Here, none of that, Bull Mike!” barked Sukune. “You don’t know your own strength—and very little else, either. Pour water on the fellow, Neil.”
The Martian revived. He fingered his bruised face and glared up at the three Terrestrials. He still refused to answer questions.
But he couldn’t have come all the way from home. “How far is it to Mars?” queried Bull Mike.
“We’ll see,” said Neil, turning to the television and checking the distance-finding device on it. “H’m, Mars is nearly on the other side of the sun. ’Way out of flight-shot. That little asteroid shows at about a hundred and fifty million miles.”
“That asteroid!” repeated the Martian in a frightened voice. All three stared at him in surprise. He recovered himself. “What asteroid?” he queried more calmly.
“Asking, are you?” said Neil. “Well, I think you know. Where does that asteroid come in?”
“I’m not talking,” said the Martian doggedly.
“We’ll remedy that,” announced Sukune grimly. “Get that spacesuit off of him, you two.”
The prisoner struggled fiercely, but his puny strength was futile against their muscles, attuned to Earth’s greater gravity. Quickly they overpowered him and stripped away his armor of metal and insulated fabric.
“Make him lie down on his face—so!” The Japanese had a hard gleam in his eye. “Hold him by the wrists, Neil. And you, Bull Mike, hold his ankles.”
They did so. “Will you talk now?” Sukune asked the Martian.
“I’ll not!”
“Well,” sighed Sukune, “this may seem a little crude, my friend, but it’s necessary. Earth needs the information—and, if you’ll remember, you did attack an unarmed ship.”
Kneeling, he laid the tips of his fingers on the prisoner’s flanks. It seemed no more than the lightest touch, yet the Martian shrieked out as if in an ecstasy of pain.
“You’ll talk?” prompted the torturer.
“I’ll talk! I’ll talk!”
“A little spot of jiujitsu,” Sukune said to his friends, rising. “It is strange how much the Martian nerve centers resemble the Terrestrial in position and response to stimuli. Let him up again.”
The Martian dropped weakly on a seat, the defiance gone out of him. Sukune produced a metal flask and unscrewed the stopper.
“Here, drink this,” he told the captive. “It’s Terrestrial wine, it’ll strengthen you. There, feel better? All right, tell us where you came from.”
The Martian licked his lips with his dark, pointed tongue. “You guessed it at once,” he said. “I’m from the asteroid. I was on a lone scout, like you; got too far away from home and ran out of fuel. I thought I’d capture you and fill my tanks.”
“Nonsense!” said Sukune. “That asteroid isn’t as large as lots of mountains on Earth. If a body of Martians had dwellings and fortifications on it, our astronomers would have made them out. You don’t mean to tell us that you’ve been living on it.”
The captive frowned and hesitated until he saw Sukune’s wiry fingers crook suggestively. Then he made haste to reply.
“Not on it. Inside it. It’s an artificial asteroid.”
They looked at him
